The Proposition

Watched this Australian 'Western' last week and liked it. Very Peckinpahesque. If anything, I think that's the problem with movies like these. Whereas ol' Sam himself was acting on an instinctive level, modern movies are much more knowing about the influences they use. Great acting, tho, particularly from Ray Winstone. At first, I thought the morality was going to be simple-minded bad-English-verses-noble-colonial, but the movie's brave enough to be much more complex than that. In fact, it almost feels like watching a wildlife documentary where the characters' actions are no more bound by morals than the animals and insects who inhabit this bleak landscape. Hence the references in the script to Darwin. Worth checking out, then, but not one for the maiden aunt.